


On 'constructive' criticism from strangers on (my) writing

by Ischa



Category: Multi-Fandom, Original Work
Genre: Gen, Meta, Writing, constructive critism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-26
Updated: 2017-09-26
Packaged: 2019-01-05 19:30:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 423
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12196200
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ischa/pseuds/Ischa
Summary: Pretty much my subjective view on the subject.





	On 'constructive' criticism from strangers on (my) writing

Because it's a thing I had to deal with recently.

See, I think constructive criticism from strangers on my writing is like people on the street telling me they don't like how my purse doesn't match my shoes (but RL people are too polite to pull that shit). 

I don't ask for it. Ever. Never did. When I want someone's opinion on my writing, when I'm unsure about some aspect of a story or character I have people whose opinion I trust and value on these things. 

I had strangers tell me to portrait characters differently, to not use certain words, to not pair certain characters because they don' like it, that my OC's were superfluous among other things and it pisses me off. Honestly I never met a fellow writer who was all: yeah, sure I will rewrite my story because some random person thinks this character is useless anyway.   
I think comments like that are insulting, especially if you are a seasoned writer (over 15 years in all kinds of genres and three languages), secure in your writing and most importantly DID NOT ASK FOR 'constructive' criticism. 

Here is the truth about the stories you read on the internet: they don't belong to you. You have no rights to them whatsoever. Whenever you like them or not, does (most likely) not change how the author feels about them or how they will write them. So throwing unwanted 'constructive' criticism their way doesn't endear you to them. It doesn't endear you to me. 

That said: there are some exceptions. 

One: If the author explicitly states in their Author's Notes that they're looking for constructive criticism. 

Two: If you think the story is AWESOME, but could use a beta – and here I also advise only doing that if you are offering beta services as well (I do that!); because let's face it: most authors know that their story would profit from a beta, but beta-readers don't grow on threes. It's hard to come by one. So just telling a writer they need a beta, and not providing a solution to that problem? Makes a hell of a frustrated writer. 

So before you throw your constructive criticism at a writer ask yourself an importnat question: would you want to hear that? If the answer is no, let it be. If the answer is yes, ask yourself the second important question: DID that author ASK for constructive criticism (You know there is a tag for that here)? If the answer is no, let it be.


End file.
